Your Blogging Staff

Contributing to this blog:
- "Dave" is Dave Barry, who is a humor columnist and presidential contender.
- "judi" is Judi Smith, who is Dave's Research Department, as well as being interested in men.
- "Walter" is Walter, a bone from the penis of a walrus.

TROUBLE AT THE CLAYTON ESTATES MOBILE HOME PARK

February 27, 2006

24

Tonight I'm turning over a new leaf. I have decided to stop
being so picky about the plot. I'm going to go with the flow. My new motto
regarding the plot is, quote: "Whatever."

As far as I can recall without thinking too hard, the
current situation is this: The terrorists still have the Death
Canisters of Doom, which may or may not have to be reconfigured. Whatever! Last week the
current terrorist leader -- we are now on our third or fourth terrorist leader
-- called up the president on the president's T-Mobile phone to
ask what route the Russian president's motorcade is taking to the airport, and the the president -- Why not? -- told him. Then the First Lady jumped
into the limo with the Russian president and his wife. So now, unless Jack Bauer
can stop them, the terrorists are going to attack the motorcade and set off
World War Three, and possibly also Four. Whatever!

FURTHER ADVENTURES IN FATHERHOOD

Today is my daughter's 6th birthday. Her mom is far away in Italy, but she of course prepared for today before she left, wrapping presents and so on. What she could NOT do was get the cupcakes. By federal law, when your kindergartener has a birthday, you have to take cupcakes in to the class so the class can get frosting smeared all over itself. My wife got the plates, napkins and boxed drinks ahead of time, but she could not get the cupcakes, and this is KILLING her, because it means she has to leave the getting of the cupcakes to me. And while she trusts me to deal with trivial matters such as the mortgage and the income taxes, she just KNOWS that I will somehow screw up the cupcakes. Since she left for the Olympics, we have had roughly 50 telephone conversations, and in those conversations she has said the word "cupcakes," I would conservatively estimate, 63,500 times. Because she does NOT want me to forget the cupcakes.

So in case she is reading this: Honey, I forgot the cupcakes. Sorry!

No, really: I GOT THE CUPCAKES. I ordered them from the Publix supermarket. I selected vanilla frosting with sprinkles and a gender-neutral little plastic happy-balloon ring gizmo stuck on top. I rejected the King Kong ring, even though I wanted it very much. That is the kind of sensitive and caring father I am.

UPDATE: The cupcakes were a big hit. Or, to be accurate, the cupcake frosting was a big hit. Turns out kindergarteners don't use the cupcake for anything other than a Frosting Delivery Platform (FDP). You could bring your frosting in on top of rocks, or pine cones, or tame (or frozen) squirrels, and the kids would just lick the frosting layer off and leave the naked FDP for you to dispose of.

February 22, 2006

ADVENTURES IN FATHERHOOD

Yesterday my daughter brought home the dreaded Head Lice Memo, stating that somebody in her kindergarten class has contracted Pediculosis Capitis (literally, "hideous little leaping scalp critters that, if they were 5,000 times larger, could star in a horror movie chasing Sigourney Weaver"). So I informed my wife via a long-distance phone call to Italy, and she instructed me that Sophie's hair had to be done in a pony tail, to make it harder for the enemy lice to jump onto her head.

As a husband and father of the male gender, I have learned that there is no arguing with instructions given in a Certain Tone. So this morning I had to put my daughter's hair in a pony tail, which for me is harder than brain surgery, not that I have ever performed brain surgery, but I just know it would be easier. Anyway, I finally made a sort of tail out of Sophie's hair, such as you might find on a mutant pony-oid creature from another planet, and that is how Sophie went to school. And if you do not think that I had to take a picture of this pony tail and email it to my wife as proof that her daughter is being cared for properly, then you do not know much about being a husband and father of the male gender.

UPDATE: For those of you who've been asking for a picture: Here you go.